Affordances of my waffle iron

Posted on 29 Jul 2010 by

I have a beef with my waffle iron. Every time I pull it out to make waffles, I go through a process to re-learn how it works. You would think that it’s hard to screw up a waffle iron, but apparently this manufacture managed somehow.

The problem lies with the two indicator lights on the front. Take a look at this picture, which is what I see right when I plug it in.

What do these lights mean? My first thought is that the green light means it’s ready to go. But there’s a red light too. Not to mention that the iron is still cold, so it’s obviously not ready to be used. After waiting a few minutes, the green light goes off which apparently indicates that it’s heated up.

The red light means it’s plugged in, and the green light indicates its preheated status. When the green light is on, it’s not ready. But when the green light is off, it’s ready to be used.

Labels on these two lights would help. But using natural cues, this waffle iron could be designed to just make sense. First, I would remove the red light. There’s no need for two indicators. There should be a single light that is either red or green. A blinking red light would indicate to me that I need to wait as it’s warming up. Once it’s preheated, the light should switch to solid green.

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